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RT figures he was introduced to Autumn when he was 3 or 4; his family had returned from Brazil to Washington D.C., for what turned out to be about 6 years. He has some sharp memories of growing accustomed to the change in light, and one Thanksgiving in particular, when we drove out into the country to share the holiday with friends. Vivid images of the newly bleak landscape, punctuated with maple reds and muted gold, everything under the slanting light, lodged in his mind.

Light is a powerful thing, and so are shadows. RT recalls the story of another little boy who came back to the United States from Brazil (and specifically, from the treeless environs of the newly dedicated Brasilia): this particular boy was scared by the shadows that trees cast. One can only imagine that his first fall back in the country was an uncomfortable time for this child.

Halloween is the day the dead walk: they have long memories and tell us things we’ve forgotten. RT suspects it is better to overcome fear and listen to what they tell us; not all their news is troubling.

Think about this: there are 45 million refugees in the world today; 207 nations each have smaller populations than this figure. Yet refugees, people who have fled terrible conditions in their home countries or who have been forced to leave, have no government.

Or think again: refugees do have a government of sorts–one that is administered by the United Nations and that is responsible for delivering the most basic of services: food, clothing, housing, and medicine. What is this amazing organization? The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

This is what UNHCR does: 1) advocate for the basic rights of refugees; 2) ensure clean water, food, basic housing, and medical care; and 3) seek long-term solutions via repatriation or resettlement. In its efforts, UNHCR has an indispensable partner: the World Food Program. WFP provides food, on average, to 90 million people each year.

The labors of these two organizations rarely make the press, and yet there can be no question that they have eased the suffering and saved the lives of millions over the several decades they have operated. UNHCR and WFP should be incorporated into any future world government or coordinate as part of the essential services it provides. And surely, any world government’s primary goals must include, when possible, the repatriation of all refugees. RT

Revolutions happen when nobody is looking; the same might be said of disasters. The map above is none too reassuring. Before they arrive at your doorstep, problems are easy to ignore.

Yersenia Pestis. This was the spark that set the dry tinder in Medieval Europe blazing in the 14th century and cost the continent somewhere around half its population, bringing the Middle Ages to an end in the process. YP, the bacterium that caused the Black Plague, devastating western Asia and Europe between 1347 and 1351, remains loose in the wild today and could be used as a biological weapon. The disaster that ushered in the Modern Era stands ready to create another phase shift.

Couldn’t we find a better way to dis-invest in our current system and take history to the next level?

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It’s not like RT’s schedule is full of free time to explore new subjects with, but here is a topic, first raised by Aubrey in one of her comments in these pages, that cannot really be ignored. Just why hasn’t humankind gotten around to creating some kind of global coordination on global threats?

Certainly, one of the reasons has to do with reconciling local and global considerations, a theme with far-ranging implications. RT will be exploring some of these in future posts, possibly tying them to the cultural issues that form the core of this blog. Climate change, unchecked threats to human health, nuclear arms, abject poverty amid staggering wealth–just why can’t we see ourselves as a single community? RT

RT has been testing the waters of crowdsourcing the last two weeks or so; he’s pretty sure that an upcoming post will detail his latest venture into economic self-sufficiency. In the meantime, he offers yet another superb portrait, this one of the composer George Bizet, by Etienne Carjat; your loyal publisher is willing to wager that some reflections on Carjat will appear in these pages before much longer.

There is also the matter of RT’s toothache and his search for affordable dentistry. Never a dull moment… RT

After doing some research, RT is pretty certain that his mother traveled over this bridge into Omaha when her mother took her cross-country to Lake Tahoe in 1938. The story is part of A Daughter’s Song and Dance, his mom’s memoir of her childhood years. (RT has been working on Chapter 3, which relates the cross-country trek).